the law of trust

atman writes (via email), "It begins with fear, of course. We become aware of ourselves and discover fear of death. Any animal can feel fear; it takes us to obsess about it, to build it into our posture, to let it ride us day in and day out. As
monkeys with crops, fear was our natural state."

Date: Sun, 27 Oct 2002 17:31:01 -0800 (PST)
From: "a. curious monkey"
Subject: the law of trust

So Jeremiah's email got me thinking about a perennial question for me,
namely: am I an anarchist Or at least, is there a point in talking that
way

Maybe. I am, in any case, a Thelemite, meaning here that I affirm and try
to live by the maxim "Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law." I
wouldn't fill 'Thelemite' in as a religion on a questionaire, though (or
if I did I would do so in the same spirit I might write 'discordian');
Thelema is a philosophical stance with ethical, cosmological, and
ontological implications. There is probably a sect of Buddhism that is
compatible with it; I know there is a sect of Shaivites who consider will
(iccha perhaps) the primary 'bhava' of Shiva.

Being thelemic is something more than anarchy, from my current vantage
point. Anarchy, taking apart the name, says "no kings" or "anti-kings".
The essence of thelema is "there are no kings anywhere." People like the
President and his gun-toting minions are sadly deluded, and we all suffer
as a consequence; in reality, everyone is perfectly free to do whatever
they like and cannot avoid the consequences that will proceed from those
choices. Although this is not a license for the impossible, truly
realizing what it means can often produce it. To oppose the power those
deluded people wield over the planet like a black cock of doom is one
option among many and anyone who truly feels that this is their role is
welcome to take it when and how they see fit.

>From a certain perspective it is easy to see humanity as a progressive
liberation of the lower centres of exchange from malevolent forces that
have seized them. This was a consequence of self-awareness, and all
evolutionary impulse pushes us towards purging ourselves of those
automatic ccontrol structures so we can achieve something like adult
sentience.

It begins with fear, of course. We become aware of ourselves and discover
fear of death. Any animal can feel fear; it takes us to obsess about it,
to build it into our posture, to let it ride us day in and day out. As
monkeys with crops, fear was our natural state.

The next great phase, and don't think it's over yet (for this is a
cyclic/helical movement) is freedom from sexual repression. This emerges
as jealousy, anti-life sentiments and emotions, destructive rages, weird
religious obsessions (think: spear that pierces the side of christ,
foreskin mutilation).

The people I was calling the 'cultural creatives' have moved beyond
body-level fear to a considerable degree. They tend to live in countries
where war, privation, and malnutrition are not the normal condition, and
can generally feed themselves even if they can't make rent. Let me
emphasize that body-level fear, like all the other supression instincts,
is a rational response to certain circumstances and we must never lose it.
But if you've ever known someone who suffers from chronic anxiety you know
what I'm talking about.

In addition, we tend to be relatively sexually free. Not done with this
one by a long shot! But, jealousy and weird ingrained gender dynamics are
much much looser than, say, in Egypt or India, or 19th century America, or
contemporary Christian Youth movements. What we find ourselves deeply
enmeshed in, as a culture, is the dominance/submission dynamic, or the
question of authority.

This expresses itself in a lot of ways. One is a hatred for dominance;
this leads to dominant behavior in a dynamic any Buddhist or indeed Pavlov
could explain. Another is hatred for submission, weakness, passivity or
some other synonym; this can lead to submissive behavior but is more
likely to manifest as an extremely intolerant dominance reaction, with
spanking on the side. Yet a third, and anarchism probably belongs here,
manifests itself as distaste for the entire dom/sub relationship, and the
reaction is to magnify it all out of proportion.

"Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law" is an expression of
ultimate trust. Trust foremost in one's self; a trust that, if one can
only access that which is authentic, present and aware within oneself that
it will never lead you astray. Trust also in everyone, for it is as "thou"
wilt; it is extending this same trust to the world, to assume that if
everyone were to act from this place of aware will that things would get
better and not worse. "Love is the law, love under Will": Love because in
that aware place our every action is taken with love, under Will because
that love is not a blind force to which we owe obedience but a choice we
are elected to make.

The Law claims to be not just necessary but sufficient. Anarchy,
ultimately, is another Law on top of this, "An ye Kinge not, do what thou
wilt." This can easily allow tyrants to prosper; that's just how
third-chakra dynamics work. It provides a safe, morally-defensible place
for people to enter into the dom-sub game, where all the choices one must
make are defined ahead of time by rules.

Fing the voting anarchist knows all about this of course :-> Emerson's
"consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds" is most applicable. In
the end, perhaps, we can consider anarchism a 'skillful means' for
bringing up and discharging certain of the harmful control structures
embedded in the collective third chakra: a means to be transcended before
the "People's Anarchist State of Wherever" starts making people go to
revolutionary meetings...

cheers,
- -@man.
"Never frighten a little man. He'll kill you. -Lazarus Long."